San Francisco 49ers fans probably should have expected this exodus.
The 49ers never were going to bring back Charvarius Ward, not after inking cornerback Deommodore Lenoir to a new contract in November and not after Ward shared how traumatic it felt to be in the Bay Area following the death of his 1-year-old daughter in October.
They weren’t going to pony up for safety Talanoa Hufanga, not after two injury-filled seasons and after Malik Mustapha looked so good as a rookie last season.
Kyle Juszczyk’s departure — he was informed that the team will release him — isn’t a shock, either. Not after the 49ers asked him to take a pay cut last year and after general manager John Lynch’s vague response when asked recently about the fullback’s future.
“We’ll see,” Lynch said at the NFL scouting combine. “We’re thinking of a lot of things right now. We’re trying to make everything work.”
And try as they might, there was always a better than 50 percent chance that linebacker Dre Greenlaw would be gone, too. Incoming defensive coordinator Robert Saleh and others tried hard to convince Greenlaw to stay. The argument was: Stick around with buddy Fred Warner for one more season and we’ll finish what we started in 2019, Greenlaw’s first season in San Francisco and one that ended with the Super Bowl.
Greenlaw instead took a three-year, $35 million deal with the Denver Broncos that gives him the chance to be the star of the Broncos’ linebacking corps. The Athletic’s Nick Kosmider speculated that Greenlaw would play inside in Denver’s 3-4 defense and become the lone linebacker when the defense switches to five-lineman fronts. Being the centerpiece of a defense — and all the riches that come with that — is something Greenlaw never could have achieved with Warner as his teammate.
A quiet opening to free agency week seemed to be in the offing after Lynch recently emphasized both how much money the 49ers have spent in recent years — “I think we’re the fourth highest cash spending team,” he said — and that the team has one of the oldest rosters in the league.
In all, the 49ers lost seven of their own free agents on Monday and are preparing to let three more players test the open market: Juszczyk and defensive tackles Javon Hargrave and Maliek Collins.
The only outside free agent they landed in the opening salvo of free agency: Jacksonville Jaguars tight end Luke Farrell, a player few fans had on their free-agent most wanted list (or had even heard of). Re-signing two of their own free agents, defensive tackle Kevin Givens and running back Patrick Taylor Jr., to one-year deals didn’t move the enthusiasm needle much, either.
Run it back like it’s 2019 all over again? No, those days are quickly fading. With Juszczyk and Greenlaw on their way out, Warner, tight end George Kittle, defensive end Nick Bosa and punter Mitch Wishnowsky are the only players who took part in that game who are still part of the roster.
The 49ers are bound to make more additions as the week rolls on. Bosa’s older brother, Joey, could be the splash addition the team was missing on Monday.
The 49ers and Dolphins have each made offers to free agent edge rusher Joey Bosa in the same relative price range… he’d get less than $10 million in 2025 in either scenario. @TheAthletic
— Michael Silver (@MikeSilver) March 11, 2025
And after losing Jaylon Moore to the Kansas City Chiefs, they have to find another swing tackle. Greenlaw’s departure means they could use a veteran linebacker and the Deebo Samuel trade earlier this month puts them in the market for another wide receiver.
There are so many holes right now that the team almost has to bring in some veterans to fill a 90-man offseason roster.
Still, it’s worth noting what the 49ers will be missing in 2025 and how sharply the team has pivoted from recent seasons when it seemed like they would stop at nothing — and usually pay a premium — to keep their Super Bowl-caliber roster intact.
Greenlaw’s exit might be the most jarring. The 49ers got a sobering look at what the defense will look like last year when Greenlaw missed all but a couple of quarters while coming back from a ruptured Achilles. One replacement, De’Vondre Campbell Sr., was slow and ultimately became so disgruntled he quit the team. Another, Dee Winters, was in and out of the lineup with injuries.
The 49ers drafted Winters in the sixth round two years ago because he reminded them of Greenlaw. He certainly has a similar profile — both men are 5-11 — and speed. But while Greenlaw was an instinctive and fast learner who started 14 games as a rookie, including 73 snaps in the Super Bowl, Winters has been slower in developing.
He also doesn’t have Greenlaw’s fight. Few do.
That ferocity was palpable in Levi’s Stadium during Greenlaw’s cameo against the Los Angeles Rams in Week 15 and its absence was just as noticeable the rest of the season. If you had canvassed 49ers fans heading into free agency, most would have told you the No. 1 priority was re-signing Greenlaw.
The 49ers surely have a strategy to fix their listless 2024 defense and to fill the holes that opened up on Monday. They had to know that losing Greenlaw was a possibility, if not a likely probability. Saleh wouldn’t have returned to lead that defense if they didn’t have a plan.
But it’s clear the team is in the midst of a significant shift. The team from 2019 is virtually gone. Last year’s squad is starting to disappear as well.
(Top photo of Dre Greenlaw: Kyle Terada / Imagn Images)
